Bunker barge loadings resume in Piraeus

Greek refining company Hellenic Petroleum has resumed loading marine high-sulphur fuel oil (HSFO) onto bunker barges in the port of Piraeus, after a week without loadings.

Marine HSFO has been unavailable from several suppliers in Piraeus in the past two weeks as refineries supplying the port have been reducing production of high-sulphur fuel oil (HSFO) to prepare for the 0.5pc marine fuel sulphur cap from 1 January 2020. Demand from shipowners has not waned.

Availability of HSFO remains tight, especially on the barge side, and barging delays for delivered marine fuel are expected at the start, a marine fuel supplier said. The supplier can only guarantee deliveries to shipowners once the barges are loaded, and it has "several times [been] obliged to be shortloaded," it said.

Motor Oil Hellas (MOH), the other local refiner supplying Piraeus, has not loaded bunker barges for almost a month, according to a marine fuel supplier, which has quoted prices and delivery dates on a case by case basis depending on quantities. MOH has taken in less sulphurous crude recently to lighten its crude slate, with the current split between heavy and light grades at 83pc to 17pc. The firm is already producing some 0.5pc sulphur marine fuel, ahead of the upcoming International Maritime Organisation's (IMO) regulation, which is easier to process using less sulphurous grades. MOH has been steadily producing more bitumen over the past year or so in a switch from high-sulphur fuel oil, giving it an increasingly dominant position on the bitumen export market to the Mediterranean and other destinations, especially compared with Hellenic Petroleum's export presence.